


Dreaming About Dreaming

by Alexilulu



Category: Sleepless Domain (Webcomic)
Genre: Canon Trans Character, Gen, Introspection, Lotta Thinkin About Dreams
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:47:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26208922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alexilulu/pseuds/Alexilulu
Summary: Everyone knows about The Dream.Some people dream about The Dream.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	Dreaming About Dreaming

**Author's Note:**

> Just started and immediately caught up on Sleepless Domain, and got extremely inspired thinking about this stuff. Honestly, I just adore Zoe and the ideas they have put down about The Dream re: trans girls and wanted to give her something fun while also giving myself a little bit of a style challenge. Hope you enjoy.

The morning after you had your first Girl Dream, you practically sprinted into the bathroom to see if it had really happened, if that had been The Dream, if you really were going to become a magical girl. Sadly, all you found was brown hair and the beginnings of tears in your eyes.

It would not be the last Girl Dream.

The people inside the barrier put great stock in dreams; after all, the very defense of their homes rests with the recipients of The Dream. How could they not read something into it? Even people who were never touched by magic have dream journals, and the city government is not shy about sending out surveys regarding the contents of dreams, to try to determine if there is any sort of pattern to them and the monster attacks.

That is why it wasn’t unusual for you to purchase a dream journal the very next day. The nice young cashier asked if you were buying it for your sister. You just smiled and nodded, unable to meet her eyes. Slipping it home and into your room was easy; hiding it from your older sister was less so, until it was time for Silver Strike to go to work. She’s so cool. A small part of your heart wishes you could share this with her, but...not yet. Soon.

Soon.

The writing turns out to be the hardest part. Putting a dream already most of a day old is hard, even if you haven’t been able to stop thinking about it all day. How do you describe seeing yourself as something...different, but not bad-different? There was a roundness to your face, but not like now, where the slight bulge of your cheeks honestly embarrasses you whenever you think about it. Gentler, like the arc of a water fountain stream. No, scratch that out, that’s a terrible metaphor! Like…

Graceful. Just graceful. Don’t overthink it.

Really, the thing that you kept coming back to was the eyes. Your eyes are brown, as brown as your hair, but here...they were just like your sister’s eyes when she transforms, that steely silver-grey like...well, steel.

You’re not a huge writer by any stretch of the word; essay assignments in class are like pulling teeth for you. But this is different. It feels good to try to do it, anyway. 

It’s like...putting your ideal self into the world, even if it's just for you right now.

Magical girls who used to be boys aren’t that uncommon. Magical girls are uncommon enough as it is, and...well, everyone knows how important they are to the city. Heck, girls who aren’t magical girls but transitioned anyway are common as all get out. You’re friends with a few. They’re nice. But…

Some part of you is still afraid of what it means. For you, for your family. Not a day goes by that your sister goes out for patrol that you don’t hear Mom downstairs waiting for her, trying not to worry. You go to bed that night the same way you always do, hoping for your sister to come home safe and sound.

That night, it happens again. Snapping out of the dream in the middle of the night, the light of the barrier still streaming in under the blinds in your shared room, you write feverishly for what feels like hours, trying to capture every last detail.

You were in a restaurant with your friends from school (or people you’d like to be friends with, at least, someday), and they’re laughing but you know it’s with you, and you’re laughing, too. And you catch a glimpse of yourself in a big wide mirror along one side of the restaurant, and stop. Your hair is longer, a wavy swooping bob that goes every which way in a way that almost looks artful when it doesn’t just look like a mess of...grey? No, _silver,_ silver is right.

You burst out of your bedroom again, as quietly as you can, just to be sure tonight wasn’t the night. It isn’t, but...for just a moment, you could see that same graceful curve at your jawline.

You go back to your book and try to put it into an image, draw a little sketch of what you looked like. You’re not much of an artist, either, but looking at it in the orange light of the barrier makes your heart swell. 

You have something to shoot for now. Something to believe in.

This consumes your nights for the next few months. Before long, your sister goes to college and retires as Silver Strike, and you have to go get another journal. You’ve been growing your hair out and it’s doing the same thing you remember from your dream, only much less artfully so it looks a bit like a bird’s nest at the wrong angle, but it makes you beam every morning in the mirror to see it. 

The cashier doesn’t even blink when you set down the mauve journal at the checkout counter. She compliments it, even. You manage to say ‘thanks, I like it’ in a small voice back, and return her wave when you leave.

The dreams are all different, but you feel like your image of yourself in them is getting sharper. The hair gets a little more clear, the sparkle in those eyes when you find yourself smiling and catch your reflection in the water, or a storefront, or just a mirror you pass by. You’ve gotten a little better at art since then, too, so the doodles of yourself as you wish you were with all your heart are a lot better than the peach-shaped scribbly mess from that second night. Your nose hasn’t changed at all, but you can render it properly now, the little upturned button your sister always loved to flick with a finger and laugh when you got upset, only to apologize because she thought it was just so cute.

The fact that she thought it was so cute made you really happy when you realized it was the same in your dreams.

And then, one night, you had a dream that you didn’t know was The Dream, not yet.

You were in a park, a big sprawling expanse of green, only it wasn’t green. Everything was the silver-grey of freshly polished metal, even the trees, the leaves that would drift down. You caught one as it fell and it felt heavy in your hand, but pliable. You rolled it into a ball and felt it roll in your palm until a bit of wind blew it out, blowing more leaves through the park. Turning to watch them, you see a plaza in the center, and a statue of a magical girl in the center. When you reach it, you realize that the statue is faceless, as polished and shiny as the trees and the grass, the flowers blooming all around you. In a blink, you realize that it’s not very big at all...it’s about your height, in fact.

Without even thinking, you begin to move, grabbing leaves from the wind and the trees, tugging flowers from their beds and working them in your hands frantically. They yield like clay in your hands, and adhere to the statue like they had always been part of it as you work it against the faceless statue, filling in the features you have spent months memorizing, spending every waking and sleeping moment dreaming of.

The brow arches just so, slender and high. The nose you could make in your sleep. The cheeks, high and round, the curve of the jaw graceful down to a small chin. The smile is harder, because you see it so rarely, but you know when it’s just right. When you finish, the wind picks up, the leaves blowing from the trees and obscuring your vision in a storm of gleaming grey.

When your vision clears, you’re standing in the statue’s place, wearing the clothes it had as if they were made just for you. And when you look up, you see a blonde girl in a white dress, her hair falling to obscure her face.

“I’m sorry it took so long. I wanted to give you time, to...well.” She smiles, and you can feel your heart thud in your chest. “You get it.” When you nod, her smile fades. “I’m asking something awful of you, a burden most can scarcely bear, let alone shine through. The world...it should not be your weight to carry. But I must ask of you this nevertheless.”

You shake your head. “I can do it. I want to be like my sister, someone who can give other people hope and give them safety. That’s what a magical girl is, right?” At that, the girl looks wan, but returns to that smile once more.

“I pray that you remember that with all your heart, when the time comes.” She looks away. “Be strong, young one. You have so much more in front of you than you know.”

When you wake up, you don’t even remember to look in the mirror in your room until you pause in writing the dream down, realizing you don’t remember what happens after the wind gusts and your vision greyed out in a storm of leaves. Running downstairs to Mom in your pajamas, she bursts into tears within moments of realizing what happened. You can scarcely move before she hugs you, holding you tightly as you both break down, your tears of joy intermingling with her own.

After that, you don’t use the dream journal as much, in the whirlwind of activity as you register with the city, move to the new school. After all, now your dreams match reality.


End file.
